Confronting the Odds: Students at Risk and the Pipeline to Higher Education

摘要

The purpose of this report is twofold. First, it aims to understand the critical junctures in the pipeline to college enrollment where at-risk high school graduates leave at substantially higher rates than their counterparts not at risk. Second, it identifies factors that contribute to at-risk students successful navigation of the pipeline to college enrollment. Students at risk were defined as 1992 high school graduates who had risk characteristics that increased their chances of dropping out of high school. These included being from a single parent household, having an older sibling who dropped out of high school, changing schools two or more times other than the normal progression (e.g., from elementary to middle school), having Cs or lower grades between sixth and eighth grades, being from a low socioeconomic status (SES) family, or repeating an earlier grade.